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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 39m

Single-family home prices are five times higher than the median household income in more than a third of the nation's metropolitan areas, and some are eight times more costly. @pjwhit.bsky.social

www.homes.com/news/home-pr...

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

Terner Center for Housing Innovation, UC Berkeley @ternerhousing.bsky.social · 11d

Career opportunity: The Terner Center is seeking a Senior Research Associate to help advance the understanding and expansion of innovative and industrialized construction methods to improve and expand housing delivery. Please help us spread the word: ow.ly/4g2O50WYgKK

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 2d

One issue with aging in place is the lack of American housing stock that is safe and accessible for seniors. Only 1% is wheelchair accessible, making falls more of a risk, says @jenmolinsky.bsky.social in a new @nytimes.com article.

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/03/r...

What Types of Senior Housing Are Available?

www.nytimes.com

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 2d

The national median single-family home price grew to 5 times the median household income in 2024, nearly matching previous record highs, writes @pjwhit.bsky.social in a new blog post. As a result, homeownership remains out of reach for many prospective buyers.

www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/home-pr...

Home Prices Surge to Five Times Median Income, Nearing Historic Highs

Last year single-family home prices continued to climb steadily back to record-high multiples of household income. In our most recent State of the Nat

www.jchs.harvard.edu

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 5d

Seva Rodnyansky from @pewtrusts.org will discuss a new report that compares fire safety by building type and age, and finds that multifamily buildings built since 2000 have the lowest fire death rates.

mailchi.mp/harvard/fire...

Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 5d

Today @ 12:15 pm ET: BUILDING FOR SAFETY

While building codes have reduced the risk of dangerous fires in multifamily homes over time, some common aspects of fire codes may unnecessarily restrict the development of affordable, well-designed multifamily housing.

mailchi.mp/harvard/fire...

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 6d

A new report looks at “residual income cost burdens,” defined as “not having enough income left after paying rent to cover all other necessities.”

The 2/3 of renter households that have residual cost burdens is higher than the 50% with traditional cost burdens

www.planetizen.com/news/2025/10...

‘Residual Income’ Study Reveals Two-Thirds of Working Age Renters Struggle to Make Ends Meet

Half of U.S. renters are considered ‘rent burdened,’ but an even larger number of households have a hard time affording basic necessities after rent.

www.planetizen.com

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

Washington Housing Conservancy @washhousing.bsky.social · 7d

Spending over 30% of household income on housing qualifies as rent burdened. But according to the latest research from @harvard-jchs.bsky.social the “30% metric” underestimates how many renters are actually burdened by housing costs once you include food, healthcare, childcare, transport, & more:

Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 9d

Rising rents are leaving households with less income to pay for other needs, and inflation has also pushed up the cost of other necessities.

Our new paper finds that, after paying for rent, 2/3 of working-age renters cannot afford their basic needs.

www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/two-thi...

Two-Thirds of Working-Age Renters Struggle to Afford Basic Needs

Rising rents are squeezing renter households, leaving them with less residual income to pay for other needs. But inflation has also pushed up the cost

www.jchs.harvard.edu

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 7d

Today @ 1pm ET: Dr. April Y. Silas, CEO of Homeless Children's Network, will discuss ways we can develop our psychosocial, spiritual, and internal capacities to contribute to the eradication of homelessness.

mailchi.mp/harvard/dr-a...

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

Eviction Lab @evictionlab.bsky.social · 7d

"This leaves them with difficult decisions to make: cut back on vital needs and sacrifice a modest standard of living or borrow to cover basic expenses?”

Via: @harvard-jchs.bsky.social

www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/two-thi...

#housing+ #urbanism #urbanism+

Two-Thirds of Working-Age Renters Struggle to Afford Basic Needs

Rising rents are squeezing renter households, leaving them with less residual income to pay for other needs. But inflation has also pushed up the cost

www.jchs.harvard.edu

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

Axios @axios.com · 8d

HUD today fired two civil rights lawyers who spoke publicly about their whistleblower complaint over the Trump admin's cuts to the office that enforces fair housing laws.

Cutbacks at HUD come as Black homeownership falls

HUD fires two civil rights lawyers who spoke out about cuts to the office that enforces fair housing laws.

www.axios.com

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

David Luberoff @dluberoff.bsky.social · 8d

Congrats @gsd.harvard.edu students Tejas S., Justin Joel Tan, Pranav Subramanian, and Marko Velazquez whose team won 1st place in the design/construction category in the Hack-a-House affordable housing competition (www.hackahouse.org/2025-winners...) cosponsored by @harvard-jchs.bsky.social

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 9d

Rising rents are leaving households with less income to pay for other needs, and inflation has also pushed up the cost of other necessities.

Our new paper finds that, after paying for rent, 2/3 of working-age renters cannot afford their basic needs.

www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/two-thi...

Two-Thirds of Working-Age Renters Struggle to Afford Basic Needs

Rising rents are squeezing renter households, leaving them with less residual income to pay for other needs. But inflation has also pushed up the cost

www.jchs.harvard.edu

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

CalMatters @calmatters.org · 11d

The concept of a “housing shortage” is, in theory, pretty simple. In practice, defining and then setting out to quantify the “housing you need” is an exercise fraught with messy data, guestimation and an inconvenient need for judgement calls. https://cal.news/4gLVeCj

📊 @frombenc.bsky.social

A bar chart that shows how seven different organizations and government agencies calculate California's housing shortage.

Hed: How big is California's housing shortage?
Subhed: It depends on who you ask

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Reposted by Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies

Harvard Graduate School of Design @gsd.harvard.edu · 12d

TODAY! – Join us in Piper Auditorium for the 2025 DDes Conference, "‘HOME’CAST: Shaping the Built Environment through Data-Driven Innovation".

https://hgsd.us/4mlkIrr

'HOME'CAST: Shaping the Built Environment through Data-Driven Innovation

A live stream for this event will be available on this page at the scheduled start time. About This Event In a constantly evolving urban landscape, the

hgsd.us

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 11d

And they're off! Students from @harvardkennedy.bsky.social, @gsd.harvard.edu, and @mit.edu have taken over our offices for the annual 24-hour virtual Hack-a-house hackathon to formulate innovative ideas to improve housing affordability.

We can't wait to see what creative ideas they come up with.

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 11d

Starting shortly! The 24-hour Hack-a-House competition starts at 2pm ET and @harvard.edu students are invited to watch the kickoff in our office and work on their projects here this afternoon.

Good luck everyone!

www.jchs.harvard.edu/calendar/hac...

Hack-a-House 2025

Students from Harvard and other accredited universities are invited to participate in Hack-A-House, a 24-hour virtual hackathon to formulate and pitch

www.jchs.harvard.edu

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 13d

The share of women working in the construction industry is on the rise and at its highest rate in 20 years.

Women made up 11.2% of the construction industry workforce in 2024, for a total of about 1.34 million women and a year-over-year increase of 0.4%.

www.homes.com/news/number-...

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 14d

The US has a national housing shortage and some advocates credit the problem to a lack of “middle” housing — duplexes, townhomes and small dwellings that fall between single-family homes and apartment buildings. Our new series examines the missing middle.

www.smartcitiesdive.com/news/housing...

5 takeaways from Harvard’s Unlocking the Missing Middle housing report

The university’s Joint Center for Housing Studies is examining “missing middle” housing in Massachusetts.

www.smartcitiesdive.com

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 15d

Federal datasets underpin everything from health research and economic forecasting to climate science and housing policy. But today, these resources face unprecedented threats. On Oct 1, our friends at @shorensteinctr.bsky.social will unpack the current moment.

shorensteincenter.org/new-event/va...

Vanishing Numbers: How Federal Data Manipulation and Removal Threaten Journalism and Public Trust | Shorenstein Center

This panel brings together a powerhouse group of experts to unpack the unprecedented threats to Federal datasets.

shorensteincenter.org

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 15d

Our report notes: Data shows that advances in construction technology make the two stairway requirement antiquated for small midrise buildings that can offer equal or greater life safety provisions with more efficiency, ventilation, and variations in density.

www.jchs.harvard.edu/research-are...

Legalizing Mid-Rise Single-Stair Housing in Massachusetts

There is a growing recognition that zoning reform alone won’t solve the housing crisis. This report examines staircases and the common building code

www.jchs.harvard.edu

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 15d

The sheer volume of Massachusetts' regulations for building new housing can drive up the costs in significant ways. For example, the requirement for two stairwells along with other fire safety regulations can add 15-25% to the cost of a project. @bostonglobe.com

www.bostonglobe.com/2025/09/21/o...

Roll back regulations to lower housing costs - The Boston Globe

The sheer volume of Massachusetts’ regulations can drive up the total cost of construction in significant ways. But some rules are no longer necessary.

www.bostonglobe.com

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 18d

LIVE NOW: Our @dmccue.bsky.social shares the Center's projections for household and homeownership growth over the next decade (tldr: significant slowdown ahead).

www.jchs.harvard.edu/calendar/loo...

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Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 19d

TODAY @ 2pm ET: Our senior research associate Daniel McCue discusses how shifting demographics, a persistently challenging homebuying environment, and changing immigration policies will affect household formation in the coming decades. @dmccue.bsky.social

mailchi.mp/harvard/proj...

Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies @harvard-jchs.bsky.social · 20d

Even with a slight drop in interest rates, “unaffordability is going to be here for a while,” said our managing director Chris Herbert.

The typical buyer needs to earn $126K a year to afford the median home price, a 60% jump from the $79K required in 2021.

www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

In some markets, even a 0% mortgage wouldn’t make homes affordable

The Fed’s recent rate cut won’t bring down borrowing costs enough to offset the rise in housing prices in most major U.S. cities, Zillow’s research suggests.

www.washingtonpost.com

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